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13 Remembering Rabindranath Tagore who belong to the underprivileged sections of society. He represents the new social consciousness of educated Bengalis of this period, and the emerging spirit of individualism characteristic of the time (Sogani 88). His opposition to Mahendra’s adulterous love for Binodini suggests a conservative, didactic mindset; yet his desire to marry the widowed Binodini also indicates a liberal outlook and a progressive social awareness. In the tussle between reason and passion, Bihari finds himself unable to live up to his own ideal of moral duty. He first falls in love with Asha, another man’s wife, and then feels drawn by Binodini’sseductive charm. It is this ambivalence that gives his character the psychological complexity that defines the modernity of Tagore’s approach in Chokher Bali. The central, and most complex figure, of course, is Binodini. She confounds the distinctions between prachina and nabina created by Bankimchandra in his classification of nineteenth century women. Instead, she “is an intriguing amalgam of the various types of Bengali women that Chatterjee has put into exclusive compartments” (Panja 217). Contrary to the image of the pure, chaste “bhadramahila” or respectable upper-class woman, Binodini assertively expresses her individual needs and desires. Though a transgressive figure in the first part of the novel, Binodini is transformed by her love for Bihari, and ultimately chooses to withdraw into a life of austerity (Sogani 66). According to Dipesh Chakrabarty, the body, as a site for the struggle between opposite tendencies is an unresolved problem in the text (Chakrabarty 74). He argues that rup or physical beauty is not an issue in Chokher Bali (Chakrabarty 71). Most readers would agree, though, that Binodini’s character is actually endowed with a strong element of physical allure (Panja 219). She isboth thesubject and the object of desire, a selfconscious target of the male gaze, but also driven by her own passion for Bihari. But her desire cannot be explained in terms of the Freudian paradigm of the triangular relationship between father, mother and child. Binodini’s desire is fanned by the repressive social practices of nineteenth century Bengal, and it does not fit the models provided by Western theory. The modernity of Tagore’s text demands a different reading frame. Having created such a subversive figure, though, Tagore seemed at a loss to find an appropriate resolution to her predicament. The fact that he twice changed the ending of the novel indicates his own dissatisfaction with the story’s denouement. The disruption triggered by Binodini’s entry into the lives of Mahendra and Bihari allowed of no neat solution in the social milieu within which their narrative is embedded. Though the narrative ends in reconciliation, Binodini’s departure into oblivion at the end of the text leaves us with the sense of a tale left unfinished. But then, fragments and open endings are also features of the modern novel. Works Cited Bhattacharya, Anuttam. Rabindra Rachanabhidhan (Bengali) Vol. 7. Kolkata: Deep Prakashan, 2007. Bhattacharya, Prabhatkumar and Uma Bhattacharya. Adhunikatar Ruppratima vol. 1 (Bengali). Kolkata: D. N. Publications, 1991.
14 Remembering Rabindranath Tagore Chakrabarty, Dipesh. “Witness to Suffering: Domestic Cruelty and the Birth of the Modern Subject in Bengal”. Mitchell, ed. 49-86. Chatterjee, Partha. “Two Poets and Death: On Civil and Political Society in the Non-Christian World.” Questions of Modernity, ed. Timothy Mitchell.35-48. Das, Sisir Kumar and Sukanta Chaudhuri, eds. Rabindranath Tagore: Selected Writings on Literature and Language. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2001. Mitchell, Timothy, ed. Questions of Modernity. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000. Panja, Shormishtha. “Rabindranath Tagore’s Chokher Bali: The New Woman, Conjugality and the Heterogeneity of Home”. Signifying the Self: Women and Literature. Ed. Malashri Lal, Shormishtha Panja and Sumanyu Satpathy. New Delhi: Macmillan, 2004. 211- 225. Sogani, Rajul. The Hindu Widow in Indian Literature. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002. Tagore, Rabindranath. Chokher Bali (1903). Translated by Radha Chakravarty. New Delhi: Srishti, 2003. ____. “Modern Poetry.” Das and Chaudhuri, eds. Selected Writings on Literature and Language.
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Page 4 and 5: Contents Message from His Excellenc
Page 6: Contributors Dr. Liyanage Amarakeer
Page 10: Message from His Excellency the Hig
Page 14: Introduction The year 2011 marks th
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Page 23 and 24: “The Inside Story”: Gender and
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Page 47 and 48: The Musical Journey of Rabindranath
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Gitanjali - Lotus and the Empty Bas
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Gitanjali in Translation Kusum Disa
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The Nobel Prize in Literature 1913
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A Bibliography of Rabindranath Tago
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Bibliography - Tagore's Selected Wo
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